1,000 flowers, bushes, and shrubs.
The renovation of the ‘‘Y’’ and the other community service projects
was the turning point in integrating GE Plastics and Borg-Warner. Nei-
ther viewed the other as ‘‘the competition’’ or ‘‘the outsider’’ any
longer. ‘‘We were dirty, tired, grubby and so proud to be part of the
whole project,’’ says one employee. ‘‘As a former Borg-Warner em-
ployee, any questions I had about if this is the kind of company I want
to work for . . . these questions were gone.’’22
This project is reminiscent of the team Solomon assembled to build
the temple, although Solomon’s team was a little larger: 30,000 laborers,
70,000 carriers, 80,000 stonecutters, and 3,300 foremen to supervise
this gigantic endeavor. Both Solomon’s team and the GE team were
galvanized by a strong leader and an overriding purpose.
For both teams, celebration of achievement was important. How-
ever, the celebration of the GE team probably did not approach the
scale of Solomon’s team after they completed construction of the tem-
ple: fourteen days of ceremony and feasting. Well, there was less time
urgency in those days, and people had more time to celebrate.
CHALLENGES IN TEAM BUILDING
Building a team can be over-romanticized. It is a challenging, messy,
often-daunting process. Moses was challenged in the wilderness by re-
bellious team members who questioned the wisdom of the journey and
suggested a return to the security (and slavery) of Egypt. And the entire
team deviated from its mission, building a golden calf while Moses was
off on the mountain getting divine guidance from his mentor.
In Galatians 5:13, Paul warned the early Christians that they were at
great risk when they ceased to act as a team: ‘‘If you keep on biting and
devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each
other.’’ And the prophet Nahum warned the king of Assyria that his
doom was sealed because his team was becoming unproductive and
falling apart: ‘‘O king of Assyria, your shepherds slumber, your nobles
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lie down to rest. Your people are scattered on the mountains with no
one to gather them.’’ (Nah. 3:18)
Many modern leaders have also hit obstacles as they tried to form
and direct teams. Despite most employees’ expressed desires to be ‘‘part
of a real team,’’ many balk when actually asked to participate. When
asked which parts of Nestle’s approach to change most stymied people,
CEO Peter Brabeck-Letmathe answered:
You are going to be surprised—it’s collaboration. Many people like to
work in pyramid structures because pyramid structures are clear. But continuous improvement doesn’t really thrive in that kind of environment . . .
Frankly, this is the hardest for the people in middle management to accept.
They feel we are taking away their hierarchy, that they are losing power. 23
Brabeck-Letmathe adds that he is willing to work with those who
‘‘don’t know how’’ to collaborate. But those who refuse to work as a
team and to accept their place in the team have a limited future with
the organization.
Gordon Bethune of Continental echoes this sentiment. ‘‘The people
who evolved the culture here were from a culture that focused on fac-
tionalism,’’ he observes. ‘‘Me win. You lose. Most of those people
weren’t ready to play as team members. We had to make changes.’’24
Another leader who has historically been ‘‘team challenged’’ is Steve
Jobs. That would seem logical when you consider that here is a techni-
cal and intuitive genius who started out working solo in his garage. He
had little experience with corporate organizational life, whether hierar-
chical or team-oriented. ‘‘Jobs’s leadership didn’t allow for collabora-
tion,’’ notes industry colleague Charles B. Wang. ‘‘His colleagues
eventually suspended their own judgment when they entered what was
termed Jobs’s reality distortion field . . . Teamwork cannot be sustained
in an environment that shouts down naysayers. If your vision cannot
survive attack, it may not be worth defending.’’25
Because of Jobs’s drive and technical brilliance, he has received sec-
ond and third chances at managing teams—at Next, again at Apple, and
with other ventures. If Jobs’s skill at managing teams grows to the level
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147
of his technical competence and strategic vision, there is probably noth-
ing he won’t be able to accomplish.
Jack Welch didn’t develop GE’s team orientation overnight. Many of
his managers were used to guarding their own turfs; like the governors
in ancient Palestine, they zealously protected their right to people, land, and money. But over time, Welch was able to institute a more team-oriented culture, particularly through his management conclaves held at
GE’s famed Management Development Center at Crotonville. When
the head of appliances had a refrigerator compressor problem, managers
from the other businesses saw that he had been the victim of bad luck,
and so they chipped in ‘‘$20 million here, $10 million there’’ in the
same way that the people of Israel dipped into their pockets to help
build the temple.
But not every story of team effort has such happy endings as these.
Those of us working inside any type of organization know it’s easy to
be skeptical when managers and leaders at any level begin talking about
‘‘the team’’ and all its wonderful accomplishments. Too often these
statements are inflated, masking dissension, or rewarding those who
have actually contributed least to the team’s success.
That’s why Max De Pree’s team accomplishments at Herman Miller
are so remarkable. He opened his entire organization to James O’Toole,
a management consultant with a keen eye for spotting any posturing
and ‘‘sugar-coating’’ by CEOs. O’Toole’s initial skepticism was dented
when De Pree gave him permission to go anywhere and talk to anyone
in the company, manager or worker. It was blasted apart by what he
found:
The only problem was I couldn’t tell one from the other (manager from
worker)! People who seemed to be production workers were engaged in
solving the ‘‘managerial’’ problems of improving production and quality.
People who seemed to be managers had their sleeves rolled up and were
working, side by side, with everybody else in an all-out effort to produce the best product in the most effective way.’’ 26
If O’Toole had visited Jerusalem while Nehemiah’s team was build-
ing the wall or while David’s ‘‘mighty men’’ were planning their next
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escapade, he probably would have spoken similar words. In the best
teams, position becomes subordinate to purpose.
DELEGATION
Teams run best when the leader can delegate tasks and authority. One
of the first and best delegators was Moses, who learned the hard way
that one man, no matter how talented, could not lead single-handedly.
Moses was trying to run every aspect of ‘‘Children of Israel, Inc.’’ from
soup to nuts (at their worst, this was about all that the tribes possessed, but as their fortunes increased, so did their resources and the complexity
of governing them).
It took a ‘‘consultant’’ to point out to Moses the futility of trying
to run everything himself, and the resulting stress and fatigue he was
experiencing. This consultant also happened to be his father-in-law,
Jethro, who felt obligated to ask him:
Why do you sit alone as judge, while all these people stand around you
from morning till evening? What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too
heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone . . . select capable men from all the people . . . and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens . . . Have them serve as judges . . . but have them bring every difficult case to you; the simple cases they can decide themselves.
(Exod. 18)
Once Moses appointed teams and team leaders, the line outside his
tent (which was probably longer than that at any Motor Vehicles Bu-
reau) and his stress level decreased significantly.
Steve Case of AOL had a similar problem when he first started out.
Like many entrepreneurs, he tried to do everything and had trouble
letting go. He even wrote the ads for AOL and the press releases. ‘‘I
was involved in every decision,’’ writes Case. We don’t know whether
Case had as wise an adviser as Moses’ father-in-law or whether he came
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149
to his own conclusions, but he finally realized that ‘‘the only way you’re
going to create a significant company is to make your role into one
where you guide things as opposed to do things.’’27
But to be able to delegate, you have to trust your team members to
know what their roles are and to be able to perform them (perhaps with
a little coaching). Nehemiah knew he couldn’t rebuild the Jerusalem
wall by himself, so he selected capable leaders (‘‘delegations of trustwor-
thy men’’) to manage each part of the job: ‘‘The Fish Gate was rebuilt
by the sons of Hassenaah . . . The Valley Gate was repaired by Hanun